Please support our dog park proposal
If you didn’t sign our paper petition, please sign our online petition (for local Shaw and Mt Vernon Square residents).

Help us make Bundy Park a more wonderful place for people and our four-legged family members

The Friends of Bundy Park are working with City officials to improve infrastructure, public safety, and add a dog park to the unused portion of Bundy Park — east of the athletic fields — to make it a fantastic amenity for neighbors and the entire community. If you haven’t been to Bundy Park, check it out here.

We want to preserve the Bundy athletic fields for local students and sports teams and make use of the currently vacant lot east of the athletic fields as a dog park. We’d also like to continue to work with neighbors and the City to improve the overall look of the Park — for all who use it.

Check out the current DPR Dog Park Regulations are available online at: DPR.DC.gov

This week and next, new people parks in the area break ground. See more here.

If and when the time comes, what type of surface would you like to see in a dog park at Bundy Park?

K9Grass: is the only artificial grass, designed specifically for dogs. The grass drains well, is able to withstand wear and tear, is easy to maintain, and the knitted structure of K9Grass helps wick away urine for a cleaner facility. In addition, the grass blades are coated with an antimicrobial product which helps fight odors and creates a safer, cleaner environment for the dogs.

 

Sherelle from Mommie Bears Pet Care at the Shaw Field Dog Park on 11th & R Streets NW likes Shaw Field but she thinks K9Grass, at the 17h & S Street park, is more pet friendly.

More on the pea gravel v K9Grass discussion on the CCCA blog.

“The event was open to the whole community and was very well planned and I hear it was enjoyable to all who attended.”
Kevin L Chapple
ANC 2C02 Commissioner

Kennedy remembered for his visits to a D.C. dog park
August 27, 2009

“Remembrances of Kennedy have been pouring in from all over the world, but one neighbor has her own unique story.

A resident said she didn’t know the late Senator, but they were “neighborly.”

She remembers him as just another member of the community taking advantage of a favorite dog park, but his arrival was a little different than most.

‘He would drive up in a chauffeured car with his dogs and a tennis racket and a ball,” she tells WTOP. “He bat the balls with the tennis racket, and the dogs would chase the ball.’

She says she’ll miss the late Senator’s presence in the neighborhood, and is finding it hard to talk about him in the past tense.”

Come Enjoy the Brazilian jazz of DC Choro Ensemble
6:30-8:30pm, Friday, August 21
Bundy Park, 400 P Street NW
[Rain date: 4-5:30pm, Sunday, August 23]

Bring a picnic basket and the kids.
Refreshments will be available from local merchants.
School supply donations will be accepted for local students (backpacks needed).

See you next week!

The Friends of Bundy Park support anti-crime measures. The community policing benefits of having a dog park in the area that increases foot traffic and eyes and ears on the street, would be a great benefit to local Shaw residents. Key to anti-crime efforts are laws that give law enforcement and criminal justice officials the tools they need to keep our communities safe.

If you support this effort, consider taking the CCCA anti-gang crime bill survey:

Take the CCCA Crime Bill Survey to register your support for the anti-gang amendments to the recent “Omnibus Public Safety and Justice Amendment Act of 2009” so that their provisions might be incoporated into law in the future.

Although the Friends of Bundy Park believe that having pets can enrich the lives of children by showing and teaching them how to have empathy for living creatures and people aside from themselves, we are very interested in supporting safe, clean and well maintained child- and family-friendly play spaces around Shaw and near Bundy Park. We will be vigilant in supporting the progress of the renovation of the New Jersey Avenue & O Street Park which will include a tot lot.

As it’s already been reported all around the Shaw blogosphere here, and here, and with photos here, we’re equally happy to report about the new children’s tot lot that has broken ground this week across P Street from Bundy Park at Scott Montgomery Elementary School. New top of the line children’s play equipment and an edible learning garden with be great amenities for local families and young children in Shaw. The tot lot on 1500 Fifth Street will be open to the public and we expect it will be well maintained by the school while under the vigilant watch of concerned neighbors, several of whom have children and pets of their own.

Residents spoke out about the future of Bundy Park.

DC Compass surveyed local residents and stake holders about the future of the vacant lot at Bundy Park after the July 9 meeting with Director Robin Eve Jasper of the Office of Property Management (now DC Department of Real Estate Services, DRES). Now that Ms Jasper has announced that there will be plenty of room to satisfy the parking needs of Bundy School tenants and provide abundant potential use for a dog park, the Friends of Bundy believe that all sides have been heard during the first part of this lively debate and citizens on all sides can recognize a resolution that everyone can be happy with. We appreciate the leadership or our community representatives and the willingness of local citizens to take part in this process.

As noted on the ShawNeighborhood listserv, dog parks promote good examples of humane care for animals, and provide great venues for neighbors to interact.

“I was hoping that we were more civilized here in DC than in Baltimore where they set a dog on fire, but I guess that is not the case. All the more reason to encourage more dog parks in the city where neighborhood kids can see how dogs should be treated. Sad sad story.”

This August 7, 2009 announcement from the DC Department of Real Estate Services (DRES), formerly the Office of Property Management (OPM), suggests that there will be space left on the vacant lot at Bundy for use as a dog park. According to DC’s Dog Park Regulations (Section 733.1 under Dog Parks: Site Guidelines and Specification), “a dog park shall be no less than five thousand square feet (5,000 sq ft) in area where feasible.” Hence, the remaining space on the vacant lot at Bundy — not used by parking for future Bundy School tenants — would still meet the minimum requirements for establishing a dog park.

Dear Friends and Neighbors:

The District Department of Real Estate Services (formerly the Office of Property Management) has reviewed the parking requirements for the District’s Child Advocacy Center coordinated by Safe Shores at the Bundy School.*

With approximately 17 spaces available on the school lot, the site will require an additional 42 spaces in the back lot. This should leave approximately 8,800 square feet of space available for other use. [emphasis added]

As a reminder, the back lot is owned by the Federal government. The District cannot proceed with any plans (parking or otherwise) until after the land transfer is complete and funding is identified.

*The Safe Shores project is part of the District’s continuing effort to become a model jurisdiction by expanding the service capacity for children who are victims of physical and sexual abuse. Construction will be complete in November 2009. Subsequently, staff from the US Attorney’s Office, Office of the Attorney General, Metropolitan Police Department, Child and Family Services and the non-profit Safe Shores will move in and begin operations.

Robin-Eve Jasper, Director
DC Department of Real Estate Services
2000 14th Street, NW, Suite 800, Washington, DC 20009
Tel. 202 727-3770 | Fax. 202 727-7283
robin.jasper@dc.gov | www.opm.dc.gov